Way of Fate
by corneroffandom
Summary: Pivotal moments of Chloe and Cal's relationship.


"I dare you" is the term that pushes Chloe Carter and Cal Vandeusen together. Chloe is single and a relationship is a far away dream to her, Cal's mind is on his career. In normal circumstances, neither would've even looked twice at the other.

Lucky for them fate has a way of throwing people together, so Chloe's at a bar, trying to cheer up a bitter, recently broken up friend when the wheels are put into motion. Dark haired, blurry eyed Brita Samson is drinking herself into oblivion despite Chloe's attempts to distract her from the liquor when her deep blue eyes lock onto Chloe's. "Let's have some fun," she slurs.

"Fun? Like what?" Chloe asks, shifting uncomfortably in her seat. Brita's normally the dependable one so to see her this badly wasted makes Chloe wonder if love's really worth it in the long run.

"Mmm." Brita appears to be thinking deeply as she looks around the bar and the people it contains. "I dare you to flirt with one of the guys in here... if you can last with one guy for over ten minutes without losing your mind or slapping them, I'll cover your tab for the rest of night."

Chloe shakes her head, knowing the bet is ridiculous. Brita's already far enough gone for the both of them, but she nods anyway. "Do I get to choose the guy?"

"Mm, no, let me." Brita wavers as she turns and looks around. Finally her finger trails towards the far left. Chloe guesses since the table she's pointing at is empty, she means the one next to it where a man is sitting, nursing a solitary drink with a distant look on his face.

"Alright," Chloe says. "Don't go anywhere. I'll be back shortly." She collects her drink-- the one and only she's getting tonight, by the looks of it-- and heads over to the corner. "Hi, is this seat taken?"

If the man is surprised by her brazenness, he doesn't show it. "No, it's not." He notices something and pauses, a small smile lifting his lips. "Is that a friend of yours?"

She's momentarily dazed by his accent but snaps to attention, finding Brita gazing at them intently. "Um. Unfortunately. Don't mind her, she's wasted."

He chuckles. "I figured. If you don't mind my asking, why did you choose my table to sit at? Not that I mind, it's just curious."

She toys with the napkin under her drink before explaining reluctantly. "My friend dared me to flirt with you for awhile. She's fresh off a break up and looking for any and all chances to take it out on the male population. It's nothing personal, I promise you."

He seems unoffended and smiles sincerely. "I see."

The ten minutes go by fast and Chloe is surprised when Brita staggers over, a distinctly unhappy look on her slack face. "Chloe, you were only s'posed to spend ten mi- minutes over here," she says, wavering on her feet.

She doesn't want to leave but Brita looks on the verge of passing out so she quickly finds a pen in her purse that she keeps handy just for emergencies like these and scribbles her number on a napkin. "Call me, ok?" she tells Cal, pressing the napkin into his hand. "Sorry to cut this short." She smiles flirtaciously at him before directing the wavering girl outside.

-------

Chloe is remembering pivotal moments as she searches for Cal, who Sully says was caught in a snare and left hanging for who knows how long. She had never guessed one friend's heart break could've led to the best thing in her life but she's so relieved it did. Cal is her conscience, the motivation she has to be a better person. She knows their relationship seems strange and easily breakable to people like Sully but it's not. She's never loved anyone like she's loved Cal.

Thinking about him hanging, alone, cold and possibly scared in the middle of this island that still has John Wakefield's fingerprints all over it makes her feel nauseous. "I'm coming, Cal," she murmurs, glaring at Sully's back as they go further into the jungle.

"He's gonna be fine," Abby says with a comforting smile as she steps closer to her. "Don't worry."

Chloe takes a deep breath and nods, even though she wants to snap at Abby for what could become shallow words.

"It's around here," Sully says a couple minutes later.

A few steps more and Chloe's eyes lock immediately on an obviously human shape hanging upside down. Her stomach lurches as she rushes to him, all sounds ceasing. All she can see is poor Cal hanging lifelessly from these horrible ropes, pale and unmoving, his mouth hanging open a bit as if he had passed out screaming for help. There's a rushing in her head, mingling with the desperate pleas of _No, not Cal. Please be ok, you can't take him, please please_ running through her mind.

She's afraid to touch him, that he'll be cold, his heart won't be beating. _Please..._ She understands suddenly why he was so angry when she pretended to have drowned. It's a horrible, choking feeling to think the person you love is gone forever and she feels insanely selfish for what she did to him with that stunt. _I'm sorry, I'm sorry..._ Her hands slowly reach out and she thinks they look like someone else's, foreign, as they touch his face.

She gasps slightly, finding that he's still warm. As she steps closer and runs her fingers over his hair, she kisses him softly, hoping desperately for some reaction. "Cal?"

It takes a minute but his eyes slowly open and he gazes at her in confusion. "Why're you upside down?" he breathes, obviously still a bit drunk.

She laughs softly, relief overcoming her as she kisses him again. His ankles are bloody and his voice is a little hoarse from yelling but she's too busy being relieved to consider payback against Sully just yet. There's plenty of time for that, right now Cal needs her.

-------

It's not even a week later when John Wakefield takes her. She thinks she hears Cal's voice and then she's being dragged out of the church, one hand pressed against her mouth and the other dragging her along by the arm.

Wakefield doesn't hide the fact that he wants to kill her and Cal-- even asks her if her fiance would be willing to die for her. She knows that Cal would, same as she would for him and she doesn't want that, Cal deserves to live, deserves to be happy... but the cold metal on her finger reminds her of the look on Cal's face when he realized she was faking at that beach, reminds her of her own pain when Cal was strung up in that snare.

_Could either of us survive...? Be happy without...?_ She doesn't know what to do, she's researched Wakefield for a long time, researched other murderers, but she never thought she'd be a potential victim. She doesn't want to die, especially here, now, with Cal's ring on her finger.

She's not even sure if Cal is injured, a brief snatch of his voice does little to ease her fears for him and she presses against the grate once more, crying harder at the pointlessness of it. The grate's not moving.

Everything's so muddled and helpless that when she hears Cal again, she remembers him yelling for her at the beach and can't help herself, crying out for him. A part of her thinks she should be staying quiet to keep Cal out of what's obviously Wakefield's trap but she's not sure what's worse, Cal putting himself in danger to find her or the pain Cal would feel if he thought he failed her.

When he finds her and she's out of the horrible drainage pipes, she forgets all about Wakefield for a minute as Cal asks her to marry him and she accepts through her tears. They pay for the brief moment of happiness as she spots the mad man behind her and they run for the bridge.

Everything after this is a blur until Cal is cornered and stabbed through the chest, his eyes locked on Chloe in his last moments. She screams as he is thrown over the bridge as if a mere rag doll.

Time speeds up again as she looks at Wakefield, who waves the knife at her as if a promise. She's researched Wakefield for a long, long time. Cal had accepted this fascination as just another thing that made Chloe who she is even when everyone else raised their eyebrows at her and shied away from the conversation. Her heart breaks anew when she stares at Cal's floating body in the water below. _I'm so sorry..._

Cal wants her to live, she can feel it deep within herself even now, but she's so sad and everything feels so hopeless that she decides there's a way for her to get what she wants and yet keep Wakefield from what _he_ wants. She gazes back up at John Wakefield, who is truly the exact opposite of her Cal-- ugly inside and out-- and tells him bravely, "You can't have me."

She pries her hands from the bridge and lets gravity do the rest as she slowly falls backwards, the wind whipping through her hair the last thing she feels as she heads to her fiance, a strange peace overcoming the fear and adrenaline that had been overwhelming her the last couple of days.

_I love you, Cal._


End file.
